A Traitor in Our Midst
by naturalist
Summary: Remember this story? Well, chapters 15 and 16 seemed too rushed, so I have decided to replace them. See you soon.
1. Prologue

**Prologue**

Life was good in the Great Valley. It was a place where leaf-eating dinosaurs, unafraid of the sharpteeth which they knew were all beyond reach of them, spent their days eating and, in the children's case, playing.

The Valley's most famous children were, for once, out of all trouble and playing blissfully in the Tall Trees. Their game was called "Catch the Hopper." Ducky was the hopper for two reasons: First, because being small, green, and water-loving, she was best suited to the role. Secondly, because when Petrie wanted to be the hopper, the whole gang said "NO FAIR!" How could they expect to catch a flyer?

According to the rules, Ducky had a head start. The others had to count to ten before they could go after her. She won if she was the first to reach the goal tree. If she didn't, the one who caught her was the winner.

"Ready...set...go!" announced Littlefoot. Ducky started to hop towards the goal tree at top speed, while the others counted "Onetwothreefourfivesixseveneightnineten" and started after her. Of course Spike couldn't talk, so he merely tapped the ground ten times.

Petrie was the first to catch up with her, but when Ducky saw him zooming down towards her, she laughed and ran in another direction. Petrie couldn't stop in time and ended up slamming into the ground. "At least ball-fruit not fall on head," he muttered as he got up and walked unsteadily towards the nearest tree.

Cera rushed past him. When Ducky saw the yellow threehorn gaining on her with that I'm-going-to-get-you look on her face, she quickened her pace, but Cera came ever closer. That was when Ducky stopped. When Cera came close enough, Ducky quickly hopped onto her horn, scrambled up her frill, down her spine, and hopped off the end of her tail. "Huh?! Hey!" cried Cera as she screeched to a halt and set off after the "hopper" again.

Ducky laughed to herself as she hopped towards the goal tree again, only to see Spike running towards her with his mouth open in glee. _I do not want Spike to catch me with his mouth. No, no, no! _she thought, remembering the last time she had been inside Spike's mouth. So she hopped extra-high and caught onto a branch. Spike ran past the tree, wondering where his "sister" had gone.

Ducky dropped down from the tree and resumed her journey towards the goal tree. _Almost there. If I can touch it I will win! Yep, yep, yep! _She stretched out her arm only to have Littlefoot suddenly appear from behind the tree and catch her with his tail before she could touch it. Knowing from experience how hard to catch Ducky could be when she wanted, he had decided to let his friends keep running after her while he himself made straight for the goal tree and hid behind it, waiting for her to reach it.

"I win!" announced Littlefoot.

"Cera! Time to come home!" sounded a voice that could only belong to Cera's dad, John Topps Threehorn. He had the most powerful pair of lungs in the valley, and the worst temper, so Cera didn't dare dawdle and set off immediately, still too out of breath to say goodbye.

"Well, I guess it's bedtime," said Littlefoot. The rest of the gang responded with their customary "Awwwwww" before saying their goodbyes and setting off in separate directions.

That night Littlefoot was woken from his dreams by an all-too-familiar roar. "Aah! Sharptooth!" he cried.

"Calm down, little one," said Grandma. "The sharptooth must be outside the Valley and just angry because he can't get in."

"I...I hope so," whispered Littlefoot.

As the longnecks drifted back to sleep again they somehow managed not to hear the heavy thud that sounded like a pile of rocks hitting the ground.


	2. Shock

**Chapter I: Shock**

Littlefoot awoke the next morning to find his grandparents gone. The breeze brought to his ears the sound of worried voices. He followed the sounds to find his friends with their parents, and many other dinosaurs of the Valley, gathered around the carcass of a bignose.

"What's going on?" Littlefoot asked Ducky.

"I do not know," said Ducky. " I cannot see anything. But the grownups are worried, they are."

"Grandpa! Grandma! What's happening?"

"Old Bignose is--um, er, uh..." faltered Grandpa.

"He's dead," snorted Threehorn.

"He looks like he was killed by a sharptooth," said Grandma.

"A SHARPTOOTH?!" cried the friends. Spike drove his head into the ground.

"But the Great Rock Wall..." said Littlefoot.

"That's the mystery," said Grandpa.

Just then a runner came, well, running in. "Trouble...wall...down," he panted. "Sharptooth...tracks."

Everyone gasped.

"We must rebuild it then," said Grandpa.

"Can't," said the runner. "Rocks...all...gone."

Everyone gasped again.

In the meantime, an outsider was looking out on the pristine valley.

"It was much easier to get in this time. Right, Strut? Strut?" _Oh no, not this again._

"Yum, berries," Strut mumbled to himself.

"STRUT!"

The struthiomimus who was eating the fruit choked. _Why can't Ozzy just leave me alone? _He was not allowed to think about this any longer as the other struthiomimus forced his mouth open with one claw and administered blows to the back of the head with the other.

"You imbecile! No wonder our dear mother said you'd never amount to anything!"

Littlefoot and the gang were discussing the day's events by the Brown Goo.

"Me so worried," said Petrie. "What if sharpteeth attack nest?"

"ROAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRR!"

Petrie darted upwards and hung onto a tree branch, teeth chattering. He looked down and saw his friends all laughing.

"What so funny?"

"I scared you, I scared you," chanted Cera.

"Hmph," muttered Petrie, gliding down. "You no scare me. Me just playing along."

"Well," said Littlefoot, "we'll just have to be on our guard. Remember the drill. If you see a sharptooth..."

"Run and tell the grownups," droned the others in unison. _As if we needed to be told._

The struthiomimus pair were "hunting," as Ozzy said. They were sneaking towards a nest filled with (what else?) eggs. Its owner, a widebeak swimmer, was engaged in a chat with her friend, a spiketail.

They were just about to reach the nest when Strut stepped on a twig. The swimmer turned around and charged. The pair ran, Ozzy not forgetting to give Strut a good slap in the face as they went. The swimmer, satisfied, returned to her nest.

Ozzy and Strut continued to run until Strut fell into a pool filled with a bubbling brown liquid. "Ozzy! Help! I'm drowning, I mean sinking! Help!"

Ozzy, who did not feel very kindly disposed towards Strut at that moment, grabbed him unkindly by the neck and pulled him out. "A little volcanic mud never hurt anybody yet, mush mouth!"

The gang continued to talk until Ducky noticed the pair on the other side of the Goo. She screamed.

"What is it, Du--" asked Littlefoot, trailing off when he saw them.

"What the--" started Ozzy, then an evil grin spread across his features. "Aha! It's you little sap suckers again. Well, this time you're not getting away."


	3. The Detectives

**Chapter II: The Detectives**

"Oh no, it couldn't be them!" cried Cera as she saw the struthiomimus pair streak towards her. "How did they ever escape from Chomper's parents?"

"Don't ask, just run!" replied Littlefoot, suiting his actions to his words.

It is not advisable to run from struthiomimuses. They are the fastest dinosaurs of all, and these two quickly gained on the children.

"Scatter!" cried Littlefoot. The five ran in different directions. Ozzy immediately set off after Littlefoot, but Strut stopped chasing them altogether and started munching on the grass.

"Me go get grownups!" said Petrie, and he flew in the direction of his nest. Cera, Ducky, and Spike were also making for home.

But Littlefoot had a different plan. Maybe he couldn't outrun Ozzy, but he knew the terrain better. He made for the Sinking Sand, running zigzag. If Ozzy got too close, he would swat him with his tail and try to avoid the sharp claws.

"Stop, you useless little leaf licker!" cried Ozzy.

_The Sinking Sand. Now if I can just--_

Littlefoot gathered speed and leaped. He landed on a rock in the middle of the so-called "sand."

"Come back here!" cried Ozzy. "I'll get you!" _Ha! A little volcanic mud never hurt anybody yet._

Ozzy waded right into the Sinking Sand. He could think of nothing but revenge. Then he realized that he was sinking. He started to paddle, but the liquid around him resisted. He grabbed onto a convenient rock which just barely poked up above the liquid and hung on for dear life while Littlefoot jumped back in the direction he had come and started away to find his friends.

The next day a very full Strut found Ozzy still embracing the rock. He used a branch to fish his brother out.

"What's the matter, Ozzy? A little volcanic mud never hurt anybody yet."

"Let's just go get breakfast, you stupid shrub swallower."

"What did you say, Grandpa?" asked Littlefoot. He was at his nest, as you might have gathered.

"I saw flat-tooth tracks where the Great Wall used to be."

"So? Probably a lot of dinosaurs went there to see."

"They looked like a sharptooth had tried to scratch them out. I couldn't tell what kind they were."

"Why would a sharptooth scratch out flat-tooth tracks but not his own?"

"Exactly. Besides, the flat-tooth was there at the same time as the sharptooth."

"How do you know?"

"Because a sharptooth print was right on top of a flat-tooth print in one place, and very close by a flat-tooth print was right on top of a sharptooth print. Those flat-tooth prints looked enough like each other and the scratched-out prints that I figured they were all from the same dinosaur."

"Wow. You're really smart, Grandpa."

"Well, actually it wasn't me who figured that out," admitted Grandpa. "I just showed Mr. Thicknose, and he explained everything to me."

"Wouldn't a sharptooth try and attack a flat-tooth?"

"That's just it, Littlefoot. No blood. Not even a sign of the sharptooth trying to chase the flat-tooth."

"The prints on top of each other could be a sign of that."

"I thought so too, Littlefoot, but Mr. Thicknose told me how sharpteeth hate running in tiny circles like that."

"Gee, all that's really weird, Grandpa." (Pause.) "Can I go play now?"

"Okay, Littlefoot. Just watch out for sharpteeth."

The gang gathered by the Sinking Sand to hear Littlefoot recount his exploits against Ozzy.

"I always knew he was a dumb old egg-stealer," said Cera.

"Too bad for him he not flyer like me," said Petrie.

Then Littlefoot told the friends about his grandfather's discoveries where the Great Wall had been.

"That is very strange, it is, it is," said Ducky.

"Hey! I've got an idea. Why don't we try to find out as much as we can about it, like that Hemlock Holmesaurus fellow Grandpa told us about last week?"

"Okay," said everybody at once.

So the Great Valley Detective Agency was born.


	4. First Clues

**Chapter III: First Clues**

"Okay, now what?" asked Cera.

"We go to the scene," replied Littlefoot. So they did.

"Here are the tracks Grandpa was talking about," said Littlefoot. "But what's this?"

"What is what, Littlefoot?" asked Ducky.

"Sharptooth claw marks on a tree. Not very deep, so probably accidental," came a familiar voice.

"Mr. Thicknose?" The gang said this in unison.

"What are you doing here, young ones? It could be dangerous."

"We trying to solve mystery," said Petrie.

"I would be delighted to be of assistance."

"You want to join our detective agency?" asked Cera.

"Absolutely."

"Well then, let us start searching for more clues," said Mr. Thicknose.

"Looky! I found a hole in the trunk of the tree," said Ducky.

"So?" said Cera.

"Ah...fascinating," said Mr. Thicknose. "It appears to have been created by the facial protuberance of a spikefrill."

"Fa-cial pro-tu-ber-ance?" said Ducky slowly, while Spike said, "Eeh?"

"Horn," explained Mr. Thicknose.

"Oh," said everybody.

"You don't really think that a flat-tooth would help a sharptooth tear down the Great Wall, do you?" said Littlefoot.

"Huh?" said everybody.

"It's a possibility. But we must find a motive," said Mr. Thicknose.

"Look," said Petrie. "There more scratched-out tracks." He pointed to the base of the tree.

Later that day, Littlefoot's grandparents informed him that the body of a spikefrill had been found. Its horn had been broken off. They also informed him that two egg-stealers had been spotted in the valley.

"Where was the spikefrill?" asked Littlefoot.

"By Two Boulder Pass. Why?" replied Grandma.

Littlefoot was already gone.

Littlefoot gave the information to his fellow detectives, and they set off. Once they arrived at Two Boulder Pass, they looked around, but found nothing other than the carcass itself and sharptooth tracks.

"Hmmm," said Mr. Thicknose. "There's an unusually deep bite in the tail. But it doesn't look like the sharptooth ate anything from there. Well, at least we know that if this was the flat-tooth who helped the sharptooth, he got his reward."

Spike had spotted a branch lying under the spikefrill carcass with tasty-looking leaves. After consuming all those in sight, he decided to try and push the carcass away to see if there were more. Mr. Thicknose decided to help, and together they pushed the carcass over. They both ended up coughing from the stench of rotting meat.

"Wow," said Littlefoot. "There are more scratched-out flat-tooth tracks under here!"

"The carcass must have been dragged to hide the tracks from view," said Mr. Thicknose.

"That explains the bite in the tail," said Littlefoot.

"What kind are the tracks?" asked Cera.

"Hmmm. Judging from their distance from each other, I'd say definitely from a four-footed creature. But they're too scratched out to tell the exact kind," said Littlefoot.

"Very perceptive," said Mr. Thicknose. He put his head closer to the tracks to examine them more closely. Then he heard a yell. When he turned around, the children were gone, and there were fresh tracks. Thicknose knew what kind they were.

They were struthiomimus footprints.


	5. The Tables Are Turned

**Chapter IV: The Tables Are Turned**

"Those grass nippers don't have a chance," Ozzy said to Strut. "When I get close I'll just give them one of my scariest looks and they won't be able to move."

"Are you sure that will work, Ozzy?" questioned Strut.

Ozzy wasn't sure at all, but he felt he had to reassure the intellectually challenged Strut somehow. "Of course it will. I practice it on rocks all the time, and THEY never move."

Mr. Thicknose followed the tracks at top speed. _Why didn't I watch the young ones more carefully? I should have known better than to let them venture into a location in the vicinity of the Beyond._

Up ahead, Littlefoot had already cried "Scatter!" The problem was that he yelled it just as they entered a small canyon. "Uh, never mind," he said as Cera shot him a dirty look.

"You'll never get away, you little moss munchers! Right, Strut? Strut?" called Ozzy, hard on their heels. _Ah, who needs that stupid herbivore anyway?_

Strut had stopped some distance back to eat while he could. He never saw Mr. Thicknose, intent on the tracks, barreling towards him. Strut was thrown into a tree. His injuries were only minor, but he was a most comical sight tangled in the branches. He immediately began eating himself out. Mr. Thicknose thought he had hit a rotten stump and continued on his way.

The children had somehow managed to find a dead end. They simply cowered in a corner while Ozzy came ever closer. When he was just a few inches away, he tried his look, but was caught totally off guard when Cera stepped forward and imitated it perfectly. She had remembered what her father had taught her: _Stand and fight. Don't run away._

Ozzy spread his claws and moved closer. So did Cera.

"What do you think you're doing, you stupid tree taster? Think I'm fooling around with you, do you?"

"I'm not afraid of you, you big bully!" said Cera.

Ozzy reached out and grabbed Cera by the horn. He didn't notice the others behind her.

"CHARGE!" shouted Littlefoot.

"Huh?" said Ozzy, letting go of Cera. The next instant he had been bowled over by the young threehorn.

Mr. Thicknose, out of breath and slowed to a walking pace, suddenly froze when he saw an egg-stealer running past with five laughing children in pursuit. He blinked a few times and started off in the direction they had gone.


	6. Obstacle

**Chapter V: Obstacle**

Ozzy ran like the coward that he was until he tripped over a tree root. Just then a branch broke and fell on top of him, followed by Strut.

"Strut, you stupid branch bounder! What were you doing up there?"

"Eating."

"I mean how did you get up there?"

"I flew."

Ozzy saw that he was getting nowhere fast, so he simply slapped Strut a few times, and they walked away.

Mr. Thicknose had caught up with the children, who were gazing at a trail of flat-tooth footprints. "Look, Mr. Thicknose!" said Petrie. "We find new clues. See?"

"Young ones, I fear that you are mistaken. Those are MY tracks. I made them when I was searching for you."

"Oh," said Cera. "Well, at least those smelly old egg thieves won't bother us again."

"Ehhhhh eeeeh mmmm," agreed Spike.

"CERA! COME HOME NOW!" called a distant voice.

"It's not even close to bedtime," said Cera. "It must be important." So she went, and the others went with her.

At Cera's nest, Mr. Threehorn informed them that the grownups had decided that they were not to wander farther than two miles away from their nests due to the sharpteeth that were somewhere in the Valley.

"But Daddy, we..."

"You what?"

"Nothing."

Thicknose did not wish to arouse Threehorn's temper, and so said nothing, while Littlefoot whispered to the others, "Now how are we going to solve the mystery?"

"We will have to be very lucky, we will," said Ducky. She started humming "Bad Luck" to herself, adding the lyrics here and there.

"_When a sharptooth finds you all alone..._"

"Please no sing that," said Petrie. "It make Petrie nervous."

Then Petrie fainted from a stench of rotting meat.

Sharptooth breath.


	7. The Killer Revealed

**Chapter VI: The Killer Revealed**

"Make that one mile," grunted Threehorn as he charged forward, forming a barrier between the sharptooth--a twoclaw--and the children. Thicknose joined him. "Run, young ones!"

"We'll go get help," said Littlefoot. "Cera, you go to Mr. Clubtail. Spike, you carry Petrie to his nest. Ducky and I will go to our nests."

Cera did not think too highly of "greedy old" Mr. Clubtail, but she had to admit he was quite a fighter. So she set off.

Ducky's nest was the nearest to Cera's, and in no time her mother had arrived with two heavy branches, of course telling Ducky to stay at the nest. Her father was rarely nearby, because he was a seeker after knowledge and wandered the Beyond or the farther reaches of the Valley for days at the time.

Neither the sharptooth nor his opponents had made a move yet. Both had merely made threatening noises, and neither was backing down. The sharptooth had not really wished to reveal his whereabouts, but having just eaten a good meal of spikefrill he was sleepy, and his judgment was a little clouded. If he could just hold these herbivores off long enough to disappear, or kill them all so that they would tell no tales, that would be good enough. When it comes to hunting, twoclaws are careful. They measure profit against risk, and if the profit is not higher than the risk by a wide margin, why bother?

Spike had somehow managed to communicate to Petrie's mother about the sharptooth, and she too soon arrived. The sharptooth was outnumbered, but had worked out a strategy.

Cera and Littlefoot faced greater obstacles. Nobody knew exactly where Clubtail's nest was. They only knew it was somewhere deep in the Sheltering Grass. Clubtail did not like being disturbed. He had found a secret path into the Grass, where he slept, emerging only during the day to feed elsewhere. _It'll take me forever to find that smelly old treestar stealer! _thought Cera.

Cera had grown and could now cross the Sinking Sand on her own. She found her way into the tall grass. _Now to find Clubtail._

Littlefoot faced no such trouble on the way to his nest. "Grandpa! Grandma! Sharptooth! It's at Cera's nest!"

"You saw the sharptooth?" asked Grandpa. "That's good. Er, no, that's bad. No, that's good and bad."

"Never mind, dear," said Grandma. "We have to go help."

The sharptooth backed off while the others slowly advanced. Then the sharptooth broke off a tree branch and hurled it at Ducky's mom. She was knocked out cold, and the hunter charged past them. Petrie's mom had flown down to attend to the swimmer, who was her best friend, and just barely missed being stepped on, while Thicknose received a slash down his side. The sharptooth had originally planned to keep running after breaking through the blockade, but once the smell of Thicknose's blood reached his nose, instinct took over and he turned and started towards the flat-teeth again.

Littlefoot wanted to go with his grandparents, but they had, not unexpectedly, told him to stay at the nest. He was trying to take a nap, and was unaware that a pair of egg-stealers were sneaking up on him. Five young flat-teeth might defeat one struthiomimus, but one young flat-tooth, even a longneck, against two egg-stealers? Not likely.

_Great. Just great. I can't see anything in this_, thought Cera. _Ah, here's my own trail. I've been walking in a circle._ _Where's Clubtail? Why'd Littlefoot send ME to find Clubtail? The next time we play Sharptooth Attack, I'll get him back for this twice over._

Littlefoot woke from his very short nap to see two struthiomimuses standing over him. Instinct told him to run, and run he did. Strut ran ahead of Ozzy this time, which was a rarity, because Ozzy was holding a tree branch in case Littlefoot tried to fight, and this slowed him down.

_Where should I run? I don't want to meet the sharptooth. Then again, if I find the sharptooth, he might scare away those egg thieves. But then my grandparents might think I left the nest. Boy, that branch looks heavy. I don't want to get hit with it. Should I go to the Sinking Sand? They won't fall for the trick again, and I'm pretty sure they can jump. Maybe I can make it to the Sheltering Grass. It's easy to get lost in there, though. The time I found Chomper it was so much shorter. I wonder why it's so tall now. I wonder if Cera is lost..._

Littlefoot was thinking so hard that he wasn't watching where he was going. He just barely missed several trees. Then a low branch hit him on the side and brought him back to his senses. He picked up speed again and started dodging through the trees.

Littlefoot's grandparents had just arrived at the battle scene to see Ducky's mom unconscious and Petrie's mom trying to revive her. Thicknose had a gash down his side, and had walked some distance off to where the females were, not sure whether he could survive a second wound. Threehorn was holding off the sharptooth alone. He was already scratched in several places, and had left marks on the hunter as well.

"What's he doing?" gasped Petrie's mom as Threehorn walked some distance away from the sharptooth.

"Preparing to charge," replied Mr. Thicknose.

He was right. Threehorn ran towards the sharptooth at full charging speed. The sharptooth stood still, then as Threehorn came close, it lifted its foot and kicked Threehorn hard under the jaw. Now Threehorn was out, and Littlefoot's grandparents, after tending to Ducky's mom as best they could, had to face the sharptooth. Grandma whipped her tail out while Grandpa pushed Threehorn to a safer place, only to have the sharptooth pull his head back a little and open his jaws. Grandma's tail tip found its way into the sharptooth's mouth, which promptly closed.

Cera continued wandering about in the grass until she knocked her head into a rock. Being a threehorn, all that happened was that she tumbled backwards. However, she was a bit surprised to hear the rock saying, with a strange mix of annoyance and concern, "Afternoon, Miss Threehorn. What brings you here?"

Littlefoot was still running. He could still see Ozzy behind him, but not Strut. He skipped through the trees quickly. He was making for Hyp's nest, which was on the other side of the grove.

_Almost there...What?!_

Littlefoot saw Strut in front of him with claws spread wide. He screeched to a halt.


	8. An Unlikely Ally

**Chapter VII: An Unlikely Ally**

Grandma Longneck screamed in agony. The sharptooth had bitten down on her tail hard. Grandpa had whipped it, forcing it to let go, but the predator's teeth had found their way through the spinal cord. Her tail tip spasmed as the neurons went through their death throes. Further up and that agony would have lasted only briefly. The old longneck forced herself to walk over to where Petrie's mom was. She forced herself to lie down. The flyer was still trying to revive Ducky's mom and Mr. Threehorn, and was quite unprepared to handle a shaking longneck tail tip as big as herself.

"A sharptooth, you say," said Clubtail. "They need the services of old Clubtail, do they? Well, I suppose I have an obligation to the Valley. I don't like anyone coming by my special path, Miss Threehorn, so if you don't mind..." and he wrapped a blade of grass around her eyes. "Now, I'll help you get up on my back." He did so.

_I have to ride on him?! _thought Cera. _He has a really bumpy back, and he's slow, and why doesn't he want me to know about his path? It sounds suspicious. _She tried to take the blindfold off, but Clubtail spotted her. "Really, Miss Threehorn, if you want to get lost in the grass, you're welcome to it. I don't really like passengers, and if you try that again I'll take you in that direction and leave you there, sharptooth or not."

_Why that...He's definitely the one who helped the sharptooth get in. He doesn't sound worried at all. _

Littlefoot looked back at Ozzy coming toward him. He looked to the left and saw the trees so thick there was no space for him. He looked to the right and saw the same thing. He knew he had to charge Strut, but wasn't sure he could manage to knock him down. But he charged anyway.

At the last possible moment, though, his courage failed him and he stopped just inches away from Strut. He was extremely surprised to hear Strut saying, "Keep going, kid. Just run right past me."

Not sure whether or not to believe the struthiomimus, Littlefoot asked, "Why are you helping me?"

"Because Ozzy's mean. Besides, eggs are yucky. I'm sorry I wanted to throw you off the Great Whatchamacallit."

Littlefoot saw Ozzy closing in on him and ran past Strut, still on his course to Hyp's nest.

The sharptooth wondered why these flat-teeth didn't just run. As Grandpa attacked him, lashing out with his tail, he dodged like a sickleclaw, all the while moving closer, before going for the neck and missing by inches. But he followed up with a heavy kick to the side. "Not this again," muttered Grandpa, knocked down flat. The sharptooth roared and prepared to deliver a death blow.

Petrie at his nest woke from his faint, surrounded by his siblings. "Where Mama?" he asked.

"She went to fight the sharptooth," replied one of his brothers.

"Sh-sh-sharptooth? Mama in trouble! Me go help!" Petrie flew off.

Ducky and Spike and their siblings were also at their nest.

"Spike, I am worried about Mama, I am."

"Me too," said her shy, orange sister.

"Look!" said another young swimmer. "I see Petrie!"

"Petrie!" called Ducky, and Petrie flew down.

"How Mama?" asked Petrie worriedly.

"I do not know. She has not come back here yet, no, no, no."

"Me mean my Mama."

"I do not know either, I do not."

"Me go find out. Me tell you when me get back," said Petrie, then rose back up into the air.

"What are you doing here?" asked Hyp's dad roughly.

"Egg stealers in the woods," panted Littlefoot.

"Hi, hatchling," said Hyp. "Wanna play tag?"

"Hyp! Don't go in the woods!"

"Why not, Dad?"

"Egg stealers," replied Littlefoot. "They...he is probably still following me."

"Egg-stealers? Woooaaah!" yelled Hyp, dodging behind a convenient boulder.

"What do you mean he, instead of they?"

"Long story. By the way, there's a sharptooth at Mr. Threehorn's nest..."

_Oh well. At least I'm not riding on Elsie, _thought Cera. _I wish he would let me take this stupid grass blade off so I could see. _She was already dizzy from Clubtail's side-to-side motion, and fell off with a cry of "Oof!" followed by a scream and then silence.

"What's the matter, Miss Threehorn?" asked Clubtail. There was no answer. Clubtail looked down and found Cera unconscious with two telltale punctures in her leg. She had been bitten by a scaly worm, or snake as the farwalkers say. She was still breathing, though.

In the forest, Ozzy cried, "Strut! Why did you let that plant popper escape?"

"I've had enough of you, Ozzy! I'm going to join the vegetarians."

"Just try it!" shouted Ozzy, raising his branch. Strut shot out a claw, grabbing the branch, and they grappled for it, rolling over and over and getting knocked into various trees. Finally Ozzy kicked Strut in the stomach. Strut fell down. Ozzy stepped onto his tail and raised his branch, aiming for the head.

Grandma saw her mate down and, thinking as clearly as she could through her terrible pain, pushed a tree down with her hind legs (she was still lying on her side.) It fell between Grandpa and the sharptooth, sweeping the latter off its feet. The two rose at almost the same instant, and Grandpa struck the sharptooth a resounding whack. It backed off...and started toward Ducky's mom and the others.

"Oh, dear," muttered Petrie's mom. "Female flyers aren't cut out for this."


	9. Victory

**Chapter VIII: Victory**

Grandpa's side was still aching from the kick the sharptooth had given him. It was a few moments before he noticed the sharptooth heading toward the out-of-action dinosaurs. Petrie's mom was bravely trying to hold it off by pecking at his eyes, but the sharptooth thought no more of her than Littlefoot would of a fly. It got ready to bite into its target, Ducky's mom.

Grandma, still lying on her side, prevented this by kicking it hard. The sharptooth fell down and was immediately pelted with hard rocks, thrown by none other than Hyp's dad. It rolled over and got up, charged towards the runner, and snapped at him, missing by inches as Hyp's dad nimbly dodged out of the way. "Don't you dare snap at me!" shouted Hyp's dad, throwing another rock which broke a few teeth. Slowly the runner lured the sharptooth away from Ducky's mom and the others.

Petrie's mom landed and watched the runner, always staying just out of reach, draw the sharptooth toward Grandpa's tail. Then she heard a voice. It said, "Mama!"

"Petrie? I told you to stay at the nest!"

"Me and Ducky so worried. Me not able to stay at nest," said Petrie. "Me so happy you not hurt! Me love you, Mama!"

Petrie's mom couldn't think of anything to say but "I love you too, Petrie."

Then the young flyer's gaze drifted to Ducky's mom, stretched out on the ground. "She not--"

"No, dear. She'll be okay."

Nearby Grandma, her terrible pain replaced by a numb sensation in her tail tip which now hung limply, rose to her feet again and started toward the sharptooth, as did Mr. Thicknose, who felt that he had made the wrong decision in leaving the battle so early. Petrie's mom stayed to attend to the swimmer and Threehorn, but Petrie set off for Ducky's nest, where he reported everything to Ducky and her siblings.

Ozzy grinned. "You know, dear brother, I've always wanted to break your skull." He brought the branch down, but Strut moved his head just enough for the branch to hit the ground instead. Then he quickly bit down on it and tried to tug it away. Once again he was grappling for the branch with Ozzy. In the course of this tug-of-war Ozzy lifted his foot from Strut's tail, whereupon Strut immediately sprang up, broke off his own branch from a nearby tree, and tried to attack Ozzy with it.

At first sight it was comical. Strut would hit Ozzy on the side, and Ozzy would return the favor, and so on and so on, but finally Ozzy lost all patience (not that he ever had any in the first place) and charged without his branch, headbutting Strut in the chest. Strut staggered back and dodged behind a tree. Then a (rare) idea came to him. _Run! _it told him, and he did.

Clubtail hoisted the unconscious Cera onto his back again and set off at a higher speed. The trail known only to him soon brought him out of the Sheltering Grass. His next stop would be Cera's nest, where the sharptooth was. But should he take Cera to her nest or drop her off somewhere else? The decision came quickly. He would take her to her nest.

"So, whatcha wanna do now, hatchling?" asked Hyp. He had somehow managed to shut out all worries for his dad from his mind.

Littlefoot, exhausted from their game of tag, said, "Nothing." He was thinking about his grandparents.

"Nothing?" said Hyp. "You can't be serious. That's a game for babies."

Grandpa had whipped the sharptooth hard, and Grandma was helping with her neck; Mr. Thicknose rammed its legs, and between all of this the sharptooth was falling down every two minutes, not to mention the constant shower of rocks being thrown by Hyp's dad. It decided on a plan to take care of this.

As the longnecks swung again, it ducked, so that Grandpa's tail very nearly hit Grandma's neck, and kicked Mr. Thicknose away so that he went tumbling. Then it charged back towards Petrie's mom and the two unconscious dinosaurs, only to have a heavy tail club swing toward its leg. Clubtail missed, but just barely. The sharptooth decided that fighting a clubtail was not a good idea, and ran, pelted with rocks by Hyp's dad. Petrie's mom followed it and dropped a pebble on its head as a "token of appreciation."

Not long after, Ducky's mom and Threehorn both awoke. Threehorn recovered his spirits quickly, though Ducky's mom took a while longer. They had just started to celebrate their victory when a brown and gray blur flashed into their midst.

"I'm a vegetarian struthiomimus, I swear, and my brother's going to kill me! Help!"

"Eat vegetation and help herbivores, will you?" cried Ozzy behind him. "I'll show..." He was stopped in mid-sentence as Hyp's dad grabbed his throat and knocked him out with a rock. Ducky's mom helped him escort the unconscious Ozzy to the former location of the Great Wall, where Hyp's dad (literally) kicked him out of the Valley.

In the meantime, Strut was telling his story.

"I don't believe a thing he says!" snorted Threehorn.

"You got more important things to worry about, Threehorn," snorted Clubtail behind him. He had not managed to get a word in edgewise since arrival, since everybody had been too preoccupied with the sharptooth and Strut. Clubtail had a strong dislike to Threehorn that had existed even before the drought in the Valley. "You should take better care of your children."

He revealed Cera. "She was bitten by a scaly worm. She has a week to live, unless there's some way to heal her. Count yourself lucky I even brought her here."

"What?" cried Threehorn. He rounded on Clubtail furiously. "Why didn't you tell me earlier?"

"Now, now, Mr. Threehorn," said Grandpa. "Let us ask Mr. Thicknose. He will know what to do."

Threehorn did not trust Thicknose very well after the incident with the white ground sparkles, but he knew the old dinosaur's stock of knowledge was Cera's only chance.


	10. Hope

**Chapter IX: Hope**

"Mr. Thicknose?" said Grandpa.

"Yes, Longneck?" replied Thicknose.

"If your wound does not pain you too much, could you come over here and take a look at little Cera? She's been bitten by a scaly worm..."

"A snake? Where?"

"Sheltering Grass," replied Clubtail.

"That's not good."

Mr. Thicknose walked over to examine the unconscious Cera. He was concerned, but couldn't help thinking what Cera's reaction would have been if she had heard Grandpa calling her "little Cera."

"Hmmm," he said. "By the distance between punctures and location as described by Clubtail, there's only one possible scaly worm that could have bitten her. A fourfang."

At once he was bombarded with questions.

"Is that bad?"

"Can she be cured?"

"Does it really have four fangs?"

"Calm down, everyone," said Grandpa.

"Well," began Mr. Thicknose as if he was giving a lecture, "the fourfang is a highly venomous scaly worm. It does not have four fangs, it only has two. However, it usually strikes twice, and strikes so quickly that you, if you are strong enough to stay conscious between strikes, will think that you have only been struck once. I do not know of any antidote to the venom. Perhaps Mr. Bigmouth, who should be returning today from a trip to the Big Water, can help."

Mr. Bigmouth was Ducky's dad, the aforementioned seeker after knowledge who wandered the Beyond.

"What can I help with?" came a voice. Then, as Bigmouth looked around him, "By the Smoking Mountains, dear, what happened to you?" He touched the bruise on her chest as gently as possible. "That's good. No broken bones. Thicknose, are you all right?"

"This?" said Thicknose, looking toward his wound. "It's not deep. It'll heal."

"So what do you want my help with?"

"This young threehorn was bitten by a fourfang."

"A fourfang? Better get the root of the grayroot plant."

"But that's POISON!" cried Thicknose. "Just last year, at my suggestion, we destroyed every single grayroot plant in the Valley!"

"Bigmouth, do you want to make me into a murderer?" roared Threehorn. "If we give this to her and she dies, I WILL KILL YOU!" Then he walked away and hid behind a particularly large tree, not wanting the others to see his tears.

"Now, now, Mr. Threehorn, no need to be unreasonable," began Grandpa, but Grandma gave him a nudge.

"In small doses it can counteract scaly worm venom," said Bigmouth. "But only one kind will work, and it only grows on the Mountain of Fear."

"W-w-what?" cried Ducky's mom. "But it would be suicide to try to go there, and getting there would be suicide too!"

"The Mountain of Fear? That's just a bedtime story," said Grandpa.

"But the Mountain of Fear is haunted by the spirits of sickleclaws who killed themselves after a threehorn killed their leader. No flat-tooth is welcome there, especially not a threehorn, or one who wishes to help a threehorn," said Ducky's mom.

"Nonsense!" snorted Hyp's dad and Clubtail at the same instant.

"I'll believe it when I see it," said Clubtail. "If I see those ghosts, I'll just whack them. I'll go find that grayroot plant. If I find it and it kills Miss Threehorn, well, old Threehorn got what he deserved."

Threehorn had recovered enough to come stomping back. "Well, Clubtail, I'm going with. I don't trust you."

"You don't trust anybody," snorted Clubtail.

"I'll go," said Thicknose. "I would dearly love to see this kind of grayroot that can cure scaly worm bites."

"I'll go as guide," said Bigmouth. "It'll take six days to get there."

"SIX DAYS?!" cried Threehorn. "Then what's the use of going?"

"Easy, Threehorn," said Bigmouth.

"We'll be gone TWELVE DAYS!" cried Threehorn. "My Cera will be gone by the time we get back!"

Bigmouth replied, "Have you considered taking her with you?"

"Of course I have! But...um...er...okay, I haven't."

"I'll go too!" said a voice. Bigmouth turned to see Littlefoot. Ducky, Spike, Petrie, and Hyp were with him.

"It's too dangerous," said all the grownups at once.

"But Cera is our friend, she is, she is," said Ducky. "Please let me go, Dad? Pleeeeease?"

"Besides," added Littlefoot, "we'll have grownups to protect us." Spike nodded in agreement.

"There are SHARPTEETH out there!" said Petrie's mom.

"There's one here too now," replied Littlefoot.

"It's still too dangerous," said Petrie's mom.

"But we got to the Great Valley all by ourselves!" said Littlefoot. "We got to the Land of Mists by ourselves too. We found our way back to the Valley after that other earthshake that happened when the New Water was there. We'll be okay!"

"You're right, Littlefoot. You can go," said Grandpa. "Just be careful."

"All right then, Ducky, you can come with me," said Bigmouth. "You too, Spike."

"Hurray!" cheered Ducky, while Spike grinned widely.

"Me wanna go too, Mama," said Petrie. "Me get lonely without Littlefoot and Ducky and Spike."

"Oh, all right, Petrie."

"How about you, Hyp?" asked Littlefoot. "You coming?"

"Uhhh..."

"You're not afraid, are you?"

"Me? Afraid? No way. I'm going too. I'll show those ghosts!"

"No, Hyp. You'll stay here," said Hyp's dad.

"Aw, come on, Dad! When Cera gets better she'll call me a scaredy-egg!"

"Oh, all right, son. I better go with you, though."

"I'm glad you helped me, everybody," said Strut. "I think I'll try and help you now. I know the Mountain of Fear. I lived there for three years. Of course, it was Ozzy's idea."

After eating a hearty meal, the eleven dinosaurs departed, along with the unconscious Cera, who rode on her father's back.


	11. The Expedition Starts

**Chapter X: The Expedition Starts**

As Grandpa and Grandma Longneck watched Littlefoot depart with the group, Grandpa turned to Grandma and said, "You know, dear, I get the feeling the little ones are going to be the ones to save the day again."

"Yes," replied Grandma. "Thicknose is old and can't move fast. The threehorn, runner, and clubtail will be fighting amongst themselves. As for Strut, well, he is an egg-stealer and those three will hate him for that."

Not long after, Ducky was leading the gang in another song: an old favorite, but with some new lyrics.

_"Big, big, big, big water..."_

"We're not going to the Big Water, Ducky," said Littlefoot.

"That is all right. I will change the words. _Tall, tall, tall, tall mountain..."_

_"We're going to a tall, tall, tall, tall mountain," _added Littlefoot. _ "With rocks and trees and scary things..."_

"Uh, Littlefoot?"

"Yes, Mr. Bigmouth?"

"There's only one tree on the Mountain of Fear."

"Oh, okay. _With rocks and stones and scary things, some help for Cera for to bring, so join us as we loudly sing, of that tall, tall, tall, tall, mountain," _sang Littlefoot and Ducky together as Spike joined in with a hum. Petrie, however, didn't seem to like the song. He was cowering behind one of Spike's back plates, teeth chattering.

Thicknose looked at Littlefoot with admiration. "You have great poetic talent, young one."

Clubtail was of a different opinion. "Loudly is right. You couldn't hear thunder over that. Why, just a little louder and it'd wake Miss Threehorn."

"You just count yourself lucky you don't have a son with my son's musical interests," shot back Hyp's dad.

_"Bang bang thunk bang, boom boom smash, thud thud clunk, crash crash crash!" _sang Hyp at the top of his voice (and badly too.)

Littlefoot and Ducky stopped their singing. "What was that, Hyp?" asked Ducky.

"Rock music, of course!"

"Beautiful," said Thicknose. "Reminds me of the rockslide that blocked our way into the Valley."

Hyp looked hurt and sang no more. Littlefoot and Ducky resumed their song. Even Ducky's dad joined in.

After Hyp's dad had removed Ozzy from the Valley (not very far from it, it is true) Ozzy had gone into a small cave to await further happenings. He just happened to see the expedition leaving, Strut with them. Now he was almost completely maddened with the desire for revenge, and set off after them. But he had to be careful, so he followed at quite a distance even though he could easily have caught up with them.

"How do you get to the Mountain of Fear, Papa?" asked Ducky.

"Well," replied Bigmouth, "you have to go through the Thick Water..."

"The Big Water?" said Ducky.

"Maybe we see Mo or Elsie," said Petrie, "or even Chomper!"

"Not the Big Water, the Thick Water. It's like the Land of Mists, only bigger."

Petrie darted away and clung onto Clubtail's club while the latter resisted the urge to knock the annoying kid against a nearby tree.

"Anyway, you have to go through the Thick Water. Then you have to cross the Firefoot Sands."

"Why is that place called the Firefoot Sands?" asked Littlefoot.

"Because the sand there is so hot that it will burn your feet."

"Good thing me flyer," said Petrie. He followed this up with a "YAAAAAH!" as Clubtail, having nearly lost his short temper, swung his tail so that Petrie was flung sideways and slammed into Littlefoot.

"After that," continued Bigmouth, "there's Sharptooth Valley. It has plenty of green food but also plenty of sharpteeth. Then we'll come to a very big cave that's dark and spooky and dangerous. They call it the Cave of Death. After that we'll finally come to the Mountain of Fear. It's a sleeping volcano."

Spike's eyes gradually grew wider as Bigmouth told them of the perils of the journey. He drove his head into the ground once, but finding the hole not quite to his liking, pulled his head out and tried again. Ducky and Petrie dove into the hole that Spike had just vacated. Hyp said, "What's wrong with you scaredy-eggs? I'm not afraid." However, his knocking knees showed that he was. Littlefoot, however, showed no sign of fear, only excitement.

"Don't worry, Ducky, I'm here to protect you," said Bigmouth. He reached into the hole, pulled her out, and placed her on his head.

"So then we go back through the cave?" asked Littlefoot.

"No. We keep going. There's a much safer way back to the Valley which we can use."

"Why aren't we using it now?"

"Because it takes longer. Nine days."

"We'll be gone FIFTEEN DAYS?" cried Littlefoot.

"Fifteen days," said Bigmouth.

There is not much to tell about the rest of that day, except that Strut constantly lagged behind, eating with an appetite to match Spike's, and that Ducky sang the new version of "Big Water" until the Great Night Circle rose, much to the annoyance of the grownups (except her dad) and even of Littlefoot and Petrie.

Not long after the group lay down to sleep, Ozzy came upon them. He grinned evilly, trying to decide whether to get rid of Strut or Littlefoot first.


	12. The Thick Water

**Chapter XI: The Thick Water**

Ozzy had sharp foreclaws, and a well-aimed blow could disembowel Strut or Littlefoot, but Ozzy wasn't interested in giving them a quick death. He had placed nooses of vines around the necks of Strut, Littlefoot, the ever-sleeping Cera, Spike, and even Ducky and Petrie. Now he was busily tying them to a tree branch.

After he accomplished this, Ozzy climbed up into the tree and broke off the branch they were tied to. He would drag them away. Either they would be suffocated or get their necks broken, and if they didn't, well, Ozzy knew a place where there were sharp rocks that would carve them up nicely.

Clubtail was woken by the sound of a branch breaking. He looked around groggily in the dark, and saw nothing out of place, just a few vines and an egg-stealer he took to be Strut. Ozzy, upon noticing Clubtail getting up, had quickly flopped down onto his side on the ground, pretending to be asleep.

Clubtail's armored eyelids closed and he went back to sleep.

Ozzy, congratulating himself inwardly on the splendid way he had managed to avoid detection, took hold of the branch and started walking away. He could feel that the vines behind him were slowly running out of slack. Before long he would have to use more force, and the dinosaurs the vines were tied to would start moving. He was finally about to get his revenge.

Then he stepped on the tail of Hyp's dad.

The runner jumped to his feet, staring at the egg-stealer, making out the bruise on Ozzy's neck that had been made by Hyp's dad's own tight grip. Ozzy froze, then gave the runner a raking blow on the face.

"Get up! Get up, you lazy good-for-nothings!" hollered Hyp's dad as he returned Ozzy's blow.

"Huh?" said Littlefoot, jumping to his feet. Then he realized he couldn't breathe. His breath was soon restored to him courtesy of Spike, who had been woken by the smell of food and had already completely consumed his noose.

"Thanks, Spike. Now eat theirs!" said Littlefoot, gesturing towards the others with his tail.

Spike did, making sure to free Strut last.

Ozzy and Hyp's dad were now in a choking contest. The runner had made sure to grab Ozzy by the sore spot, while Ozzy's claws were digging into his opponent's neck.

But Hyp's dad was the stronger of the two, and with his free hand he pried Ozzy's claws off his throat, then pushed him down with force that would have felled a sickleclaw.

Ozzy kicked the runner off and retreated a distance, then attacked again by running past. His claws made deep marks on the runner.

"I'm done playing with you," shouted Hyp's dad. As Ozzy came for another scratch-and-run, the runner stuck out his foot and tripped him, following this up with a well-aimed blow to the head that knocked Ozzy out. Then he took the vines and tied Ozzy to a tree. He would stay awake the rest of the night keeping guard.

Morning came, and the children amused themselves with throwing rocks at Ozzy. Even Strut joined in.

Clubtail wanted to take a few whacks at Ozzy, as did Hyp's dad, but Bigmouth overrode them, instead giving the poor struthiomimus an "examination" with the help of Thicknose. The big swimmer had settled into a role as expedition leader. Normally Threehorn would be the first candidate for the post, but the circumstances had changed him. He was usually silent, not speaking unless spoken to, or annoyed.

After eating their meal, the group set off, leaving their captive behind, with a few leaves stuffed into his mouth courtesy of Strut.

A few more hours of walking and they arrived at the Thick Water. The water was green, the mist was thick, the trees were covered with vines, and you could never tell if a belly-dragger was going to attack you.

As soon as the group was out of sight, Ozzy had forced himself to chew through the vines and was following them once again. He was so focused on them that he knocked right into several low tree branches. He arrived at the Thick Water just a few minutes after the flat-teeth did.

The group were holding on to each others' tails: Bigmouth first, then Strut, then Hyp, then Hyp's dad, then Threehorn carrying Cera, then Thicknose, then Littlefoot carrying Petrie, then Spike carrying Ducky, and last of all Clubtail who, with his short neck, couldn't reach Spike's tail, and if he had been able to, wouldn't have taken it.

A little mammal ran by, squeaking. "Tickles?" asked Ducky.

"I don't think so," said Littlefoot, as best he could with Thicknose's tail in his mouth, as the creature continued on its way.

Soon they had made their way into a shallow area of water. Ducky jumped off Spike's back and splashed around excitedly for a while until Clubtail gave her a disapproving look, upon which she returned.

Noon, and the mist had thinned out. It became easier to see, and the group let go of each others' tails. They were still in the water, though.

Ozzy knew where he was going. Instead of following the group all the way, he made his way to a huge, dead, vine-covered tree with a big hole in it, and he went into the hole to plot the downfall of Strut, Littlefoot, and Co.

Ducky was singing happily when suddenly there came a cry of pain from Threehorn. Ducky stopped singing as she saw the water around Threehorn's leg turn red.

The group was surrounded by belly-draggers. One sneered, "A twelve-course meal, right on time. Better start with appetizers!" and headed straight towards Spike.


	13. Bellydraggers

**Chapter XII: Belly-draggers**

Spike saw the huge belly-dragger coming toward him and tried to drive his head into the ground, eyes closed. Then he remembered that he was in the water. He opened his eyes and saw teeth. He pulled his head out of the water and ran. The belly-dragger turned and made for Littlefoot.

Littlefoot waited, then jumped just as the hunter struck. He came down on its back. A cry and a splash told him that Petrie had fallen off. Ducky jumped in after him. There was the sound of a mighty tail-lashing and more blood appeared in the water.

Threehorn kicked at the belly-draggers attacking him, but the first attack had created quite a wound, and the shock of it soon sent him into unconsciousness. Cera flopped into the water next to him, and soon reappeared on the back of one of the predators.

Strut had already run to dry land with Hyp and his dad, and was gesturing frantically for the others to do likewise. Bigmouth placed Cera on Thicknose's back, and they both pushed Threehorn, walking backward as they did so, but the belly-draggers were moving quite fast and soon caught up. Bigmouth slapped at them, and Thicknose rammed them, but it seemed clear that they were doomed.

Clubtail was in a relatively deep area of water.

"Clubtail! Come to land!" called Bigmouth.

Clubtail only lifted his club and smacked the water with it.

"Don't do that!" called Thicknose. "It will attract the belly-draggers!"

"Let them come," replied Clubtail. A roar of pain from a belly-dragger near Clubtail proved that he had whacked it well.

"Where's Ducky?" cried Bigmouth as the realization hit him. Spike and Littlefoot had already made it to land, having jumped across several rocks.

As if on cue, Ducky surfaced holding Petrie. She had found Petrie underwater, grabbed onto him, and used his sharp beak as a weapon, bloodying the noses of several belly-draggers.

As soon as Petrie realized he was above water, he cried, "It so good to breathe!" and struggled to fly upward, still in Ducky's hold.

Suddenly an alien voice sounded, apparently coming from a very large belly-dragger who had just arrived. "Halt, you brutes!" he cried, whacking the nearest one with his tail for emphasis. "Don't you recognize that fellow?" He gestured with his tail toward Bigmouth. "He's the one who saved me from that water longneck!"

At this the belly-draggers stopped their attack.

"Formation!" roared the big belly-dragger.

All the others swam into a circle around their leader. After a roll call, it was found that two were missing. Clubtail quickly explained that he had killed them because "they were foolish enough to attack me."

In the meantime, Ducky swam quickly to her father and Petrie flew to Littlefoot. "Belly-dragger noses yucky," he commented. The comment was met with a confused look from Littlefoot.

The big belly-dragger swam toward Bigmouth. "Welcome back, Bigmouth. Are these your friends?"

"Yes," replied Bigmouth.

"That clubtail has neutralized my soldiers. It was an act of war!"

"He did it in self-defense."

"Maybe. But I am the commander of the Army of the Source of Green River, and he will be neutralized!"

"If you will not spare him because he did it in self-defense, spare him because he is my friend."

The big belly-dragger thought for a while and finally said, "Fine. He is pardoned. But if he kills one more of my soldiers, all of you will be terminated."

"Who are you, Sir?" asked Littlefoot.

"I am General Cody Suchus, Supreme Commander of the Army of the Source of Green River. Bigmouth, I will provide an escort for you. You five, go with them as far as the edge of the Thick Water, and protect them with your lives, except for the clubtail whom you may leave to his own devices. Do not take one bite from them or you will be turned into rotting meat."

"Sir, yes, Sir!" replied the five belly-draggers, lashing their tails in salute.

You already know that Ozzy was plotting in the big rotten tree. But he wasn't plotting alone.

"The nerve of those leaf-eaters," snapped his fellow plotter after hearing Ozzy recount all his adventures involving Strut and the children. "And that Strut! I always knew something was wrong with him."

"So how do we set up these booby traps, Theo?"

"Mother would have known. But don't worry, little brother. It'll be as easy as cracking an egg."


	14. Plots

**Chapter XIII: Plots**

The five belly-draggers of the escort swam ahead of the group, looking rather displeased. One said, "I don't get it. One minute I'm about to eat more food than I've ever had in my life, and the next I'm supposed to PROTECT it?! While it's still ALIVE?!"

"Yeah, Rico," replied a second. "Suchus has gone crazy."

"But Avi, he ordered us to protect this, um, food," said a third.

"You don't have to be sane to order people around, Al," shot back Avi. "Anyway, what do you know? You're the one who wanted to try eating waterweed."

"Don't remind me of that," muttered Al.

"At least you're not stuck carrying a big dead threehorn," replied a fourth.

"Shut up, Kay," said the fifth, who was helping him carry Threehorn. "He's not dead. Besides, we have Suchus' orders."

"Hari, there is no possible reason why Suchus would want us to protect this meat!" said Avi.

"He told us. The bigmouth saved him from a water longneck."

"So why protect everybody else?"

"Because they're friends of the bigmouth."

"So? Suchus is letting several tons of meat just slip away! I say we attack him and get rid of him. He's been our leader for as long as anyone can remember. I'm surprised he hasn't lost all his teeth." Rico and Kay nodded in assent.

"Avi!" snapped Hari. "Perhaps you do not know who I am."

"I don't care who you are," said Avi.

"I am Suchus' nephew," said Hari, "and I will defend him until the Bright Circle falls from the sky!"

"So what?"

"You didn't see me killing ten outsiders all by myself in the great battle last year, now did you, Avi?"

"No."

"How many did you kill?"

"Errr..."

"Oh, I forgot, you weren't in the battle. You were sent out to count the dead."

"I'm with Avi," said Rico. "Let's get rid of Suchus. I'll attack him and dispose of him like a fish."

"You? Ha!" said Hari. "You disloyal toothed-bird! You wouldn't even dare stare him in the eye. If you can even do that when we get back, I'll give you my share of the next kill."

"All we have to do," said Kay, "is get together a bunch of other belly-draggers who don't like Suchus and rush him as a group. He'll lose his tail before he can turn it."

"Disloyal toothed-birds," said Hari, "just like I said. If any of you dare attack Suchus, you'll be broken in half, and those of us who are not that particular about our diets will fill our bellies."

While this discussion was going on amongst the belly-dragger escort, the children and Mr. Thicknose were discussing their mystery.

"What did that belly-dragger mean, 'right on time'?" asked Littlefoot.

"Somebody told him we were coming," said Mr. Thicknose.

"But who?" asked Ducky.

"You don't think that..." Littlefoot stopped and glanced toward Strut.

"Maybe he saw a belly-dragger in the river and told him," said Thicknose. "But we don't know anything yet for sure. We don't know why he would tell a belly-dragger, either. These belly-draggers are in an army, and they probably have sentinels."

"What sentinels?" asked Petrie. "They taste good?"

"No, young one," said Thicknose. "They watch for enemies, or, in their case, food."

"Yuck," said Ducky.

"So it was probably another belly-dragger who told him," said Littlefoot.

"Yes," said Thicknose. _But Littlefoot had a point_, he thought. _Maybe Strut is betraying us for his own purposes, like being allowed to cross the Thick Water unmolested. No, no, this doesn't make any sense. But he is an egg-stealer. No, I mustn't be prejudiced. Mere suspicions don't mean anything. They don't mean anything. They don't mean anything. They don't mean anything. They don't mean anything..._

"Beautiful work, Ozzy," grinned Theo. Ozzy had just finished carefully tying a tripvine. "I've already finished placing the sharp sticks."

"I noticed," muttered Ozzy, casting a glance at the tiny wound in his tail.

"Here, take this, brother," said Theo, handing something to Ozzy.

"Hollow sticks? What do we do with these?"

"Why, we blow pebbles out of them, of course."

"Why would we want to do that?"

"We could get rid of those children with them."

"Oh, good," said Ozzy, rubbing his claws together.

"Okay," said Theo, putting a pebble into his hollow stick. "Watch this. I'm going to knock down that piece of fruit up there with this pebble." He lifted the stick to his beak and blew.

Nothing happened.

Theo tried again. No pebble came out of the stick. Instead, an indescribable expression came over Theo's face. He dropped the stick and started coughing violently.

Ozzy smirked knowingly. Once Theo had regained his breath, he began, "Dear brother, you didn't by any chance..."

"YES, I SWALLOWED IT!" shouted Theo, grabbing Ozzy by the beak. "If you tell anybody, you'll be bound and gagged!"

_Bound and gagged? _thought Ozzy, remembering the taste of the vines which Hyp's dad had tied him to the tree with. _Yeesh._

"Okay, okay, I won't tell," said Ozzy once Theo had let go. "Let's go dig the pits."


End file.
